Ray Stevens. We The People. Anthem of the Teabaggers

As I’ve been saying until I’m hoarse, the teabagger movement is real and growing. This is is their apparent anthem. Rather than sitting on the sidelines snidely guffawing about what a bunch of goobers teabaggers are, I suggest liberals, progressives, and the hard left get off their self-satisfied butts and get involved in the growing populist movements. There is common ground. Is Ray Stevens right-wing? Absolutely. He’s also talking about an unresponsive government that ignores the populace, something many on the left will agree with too.

Because that’s what populism is about – the many allied together against an exploiting few. If we don’t get involved in this process then the right will own it by default.

As long as we let the talking heads put words in our mouths, we will perceive the two “sides” to be diametrically opposed, when it fact we are on the same side and it is the talking heads (both politicians and media) who are our opposition.

It’s time to sit down, face to face, and find that we agree. Sure, we have differences on abortion, immigration, gun ownership, religion, and such. The truth is, these are not the deal-killing issues the talking heads make them out to be (unless you seek a single national answer imposed on everyone, in which case one side or the other has a reason to opt out)– and they are not the most important issues.

Let the most divisive issues be locally solved. And let the most important issues– democracy, responsive government, fiscal responsibility, the repeal of corporate personhood– come to the forefront where they belong!